


5 Times John B Took Care of JJ, and 1 Time JJ Took Care of John B

by libellules



Category: Outer Banks (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Gen, Implied Learning Disability, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, John B is so soft with JJ, Protective John B, all other characters and relationships are pretty much just referenced, i don't make the rules, idiot boys being idiots together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:00:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24246163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/libellules/pseuds/libellules
Summary: John B was dragging him from underneath his arms so his feet dug tiny tracks in the sand as John B fell back and stuck JJ against his chest, clutching at him and pulling at his chest until JJ coughed up the last of the water. The salt in his mouth tasted like fish pee and JJ wondered just how much fish pee he had ingested in his entire life.“You’re okay, everything’s gonna be okay now, JJ.”or the 5+1 Things saga where John B constantly takes care of JJ and JJ takes care of him right back.
Relationships: JJ & John B. Routledge, Kiara/Pope (Outer Banks), Sarah Cameron/John B. Routledge
Comments: 14
Kudos: 195





	5 Times John B Took Care of JJ, and 1 Time JJ Took Care of John B

**Author's Note:**

> I've wanted to write a 5+1 Things fic like forever but they're a little intimidating, but this one finally felt right and manageable. Overlaps in some places with canon and my other JJ & John B fic but it also fades in and out at times because that's the fun of fanfic. Again, totally a bromance but if you wanna read into it I won't try and stop you. I just love this friendship so I'll probably be writing more of them soon.

**one**

JJ met John B at recess on the first day of second grade. They were playing fish out of water and John B. a scrawny kid from the other class with curls so thick they covered his eyes, had fallen off the jungle gym so JJ took it upon himself to go get his teacher and sacrifice himself for the greater good. That was the first time they met, and John B never even said thank you the next day when they were on opposite teams for tag. JJ figured he forgot, or didn’t even see JJ behind all the tear from the mulch gauging splinters into his tanned skin. 

John B claims they met the first day of third grade. JJ knows they didn’t, but he can’t argue with the fact that it was the day they became best friends. 

Like the start of the past three years of school, JJ found himself struggling to find somebody to sit next to at lunch. He wasn’t shy and he was funny enough that his mom had promised he could make some friends, but none of the other kids ever wanted to sit beside the smelly kid. 

And it wasn’t even his fault that he smelled. Everything in his house smelled. His clothes wreaked but he had long since gotten used to it. His sneakers were coated in mud but the Cut was a swamp and it was JJ’s backyard. It was impossible to be a good fisherman and not smell a little bit. It’s what his dad always told him. JJ needed somebody to sit with who would be willing to give him a few goldfish crackers and maybe a corner bite of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. He would even eat somebody’s vegetables if it meant food and a friend to sit beside. 

Along came John B. The kid was scrawny but he had sparkly blue eyes and a doe-eyed smile that made all the third-grade girls giddy. John B didn’t seem to realize his super power, or maybe he knew how annoying the girls actually were—with their stupid pig tails and jelly shoes. Maybe John B was just a bit stupid to voluntarily plop his lunchbox down next to the class outcast. 

“Hello. I’m John.” John B stuck his hand out for JJ to shake. JJ tried to remember which hand he was supposed to shake with and realized he’d chosen wrong when they kind of collided and intertwined together for a moment before sliding apart. 

“I’m John too,” he announced, sitting up a litter straighter as John B settled into his seat, clearly not planning on going anywhere. 

“Why are you sitting by yourself?” JJ thought for a moment about how he could answer and not make John B realize what a Pogue he was. 

“I don’t got any friends yet.”

“You do now,” John B beamed proudly. “But, if we’re going to be friends one of us got to change their names. My daddy’s name is John too but my uncle Teddy calls him Big John and me John B so we know who he’s talking to.” 

“I could be John M, I guess.”

“No, that sounds too much like Johnny and sometimes my Daddy yells Johnny real loud when we’re out surfing and he wants me to come inside. If you come surfing with me and it’s an emergency just for me, we won’t know who he’s talking to.” John B had a point, so JJ thought really hard about what John B could call him. The only nicknames he knew were John and Johnny. He didn’t really like Jonathan because that was the name for when he was in trouble. 

“Do you have a middle name?” John B asked with a mouthful of peanut butter and strawberry jelly sandwich. The peanut butter wafted toward JJ and it smelled so delicious he could feel his mouth watering. 

“Joseph.”

“Well, John J sounds even more like Johnny. Maybe we could just call you JJ? And I can be John B like what Uncle Teddy calls me.”

“I like JJ!”

“Great. Then it’s settled.” John B took another bite and then looked to JJ inquisitively. “Where’s your lunch, JJ?”

“Don’t got one,” JJ admitted, letting himself reveal in his first ever real nickname given to him by his first ever friend. John B’s lunchbox had sea turtles on it. 

“Why?”

JJ shrugged, too hard to explain to his new friend John B. 

“Have mine, I’m not even that hungry.” John B slid the entire lunch box in front of JJ as his stomach began to rumble. “Well, maybe I’m a little hungry but Daddy’s making mac and cheese tonight so I can just eat that when school is done.”

“I don’t want your lunch.” JJ pushed the sea turtle lunch box back towards John B. 

“You don’t like peanut butter and jelly? That’s okay, I got fruit snacks too. And a I got an orange that’s already peeled so it won’t make your fingers all orange and sticky.”

John B and JJ both had a hand on the lunch box between them and John B still had a piece of his sandwich in his hand. 

“If I do don’t eat the orange and I only eat the fruit snacks I’ll get in trouble. I already told you I’m not that hungry and I really want some fruit snacks, so maybe you can eat the orange and the rest of my sandwich for me so I don’t get in trouble.”

“I don’t want you to get in trouble.” 

The boys giggled as John B dumped out the contents of his lunchbox onto the table and JJ feasted on the orange slices. They were sweet and the peanut butter filled his belly whole, but JJ would take having a friend over a full belly any day. Starting in third grade, though, JJ didn’t have to choose between the two.

* * *

**two**

John B was actually there the day JJ’s mom walked out. 

Of course, neither boy knew that it was the last time JJ would ever see or hear from his mother ever again. She and Luke were in a screaming match, he was throwing stuff off the countertops and she was flinging her cigarette around with mascara all over her cheeks telling him how he ruined her life. JJ had come home from to school to find them like that. He’d heard his name falling off their tongues as if they were talking about a cockroach and hid under the patio furniture so they couldn’t see him. 

“You think I fucking wanted this, Luke? This piece of shit life being a goddamn waitress with a drunk for a husband and a brick for a kid? You think this is what I wanted?” JJ didn’t understand why she was calling him a brick but he knew some of the Kook houses were made out of bricks, so it had to be kind of nice.

“Oh sure, come crying to me about how I ruined your life. It must be my fault, all the messes you’ve made.”

“Don’t try to turn this on me, Luke.”

“You’re the one who wanted to have the damn kid. We didn’t have to end up like this.” JJ always sensed his dad wasn’t real fond of him but to hear outright that he didn’t even want to have him. JJ didn’t feel surprised but he could still feel his stomach falling deeper into his chest. He clutched the support under the table and bit down on his lips so his breathing wouldn’t get too loud. 

“You’re such a liar, you-“

“JJ?”

The gentle hum of John B’s voice interrupted the conversation and JJ hissed, darting out from under the table to where John B was waiting in the yard. He grabbed his best friend by the wrist and dragged them both so they were crouched down behind a shrub. 

“Stop, man! JJ, seriously, what are you doing?”

“SHH!” JJ whined, putting a hand across John B’s mouth and using his other to point to the house where the fighting was still louder than any radio or siren. John B nodded against his hand and then hesitantly lifted it. 

“What happened?” John B whispered. 

“I dunno. They were just yelling.”

“Maybe your dad is a secret spy and is being paid by the FBI to follow your mom’s best friend.”

“Not now, John B. I think it’s actually bad this time.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, it’s okay. Sometimes my dad yells at his brother over the phone but Uncle Teddy still send him birthday cards every year.”

“Maybe they just needed to yell.”

“That’s probably it. Let’s go somewhere else.” _So you don’t have to listen_ went unsaid but JJ let John B guide him to his feet and out of the yard, the yelling echoing down the street almost five houses away. JJ tried to look back a few times but John B would roll his shoulders forward and tell JJ about the gold treasure lost at sea that Big John was looking for. 

“It’s called the Royal Merchant and it’s got enough gold for us to a million Kook mansions if we want, he says.” JJ nodded but his thoughts lingered over his parents argument until John B started talking about how there would be enough money for them to bring JJ with them to Disneyworld and how they could get fast passes for _like, all the rides, dude_. 

At some point during their journey from JJ’s house to John B’s, John B must have interwined their fingers because when they stopped at the front door and John B had to get his key out of his pocket, JJ realized how tightly he had been holding on, how without John B’s hand he felt like he was hiding under the patio furniture again. 

“Come on, let’s watch Happy Feet again.” JJ didn’t have to ask because John B was already pulling him into the house hand-in-hand.

* * *

**three**

John B and JJ were fourteen and the waves were dancing along the horizon like the ballets JJ’s momma used to watch on tv. John B’s licked his lips and JJ could feel his heels twitching like his skin itself was dying to get on his board. 

_There’s a storm front coming into town tonight. You boys best be getting home before you get swept away_ , Mr. Valero had told them at the Uni Mart when they stopped to get candy with the money John B had scavenged from between the couch cushions. Storms in the OBX meant one thing: an amazing surf. 

_Yes, sir. We’ll go right on home_. JJ had promised with that sweet, trusting smile before winking and pinching John B in the arm. _I’ll race you to the Chateau_.

JJ had started keeping his board in Big John’s backyard shed around the same time the temporary bed of extra comforters on John B’s floor became JJ sleeping right next to him on the mattress. JJ’s toothbrush was never on his own bathroom sink anymore and Big John had even taken to washing JJ’s laundry every now and again. 

Unlike JJ, John B was going through a growth spurt and his legs didn’t always listen to the rest of his body, so JJ was the first one to the shed and practically ripped off his sneakers and t shirt. John B came stumbling behind him, completely out of breath and pink-faced, but with a gleeful smile plastered across his face as he swiped his board and chased after JJ back down the street and down to the beach. 

As ominous as the sky appeared, there was no raindrops on their sunburned skin or thunder lingering in the sky. JJ was the first one to toss his board into the saltwater and flop down on his belly. 

“This is gonna kill, dude.” John B would shove JJ off his board if he could reach him, but he had to focus on paddling himself through the waves and out to sea, so he let out a wild cry and rowed his hands in the water, hot on JJ’s trail. 

JJ rode three good waves before the rain began to sprinkle, then fall, then pour—pooling in the pockets of his swim trunks and threatening to tug him down into the sand. John B paddled over to him, the water wanting to drag them apart. 

“You good to stay out?” John B asked, hesitation resting on the tip of his tongue. 

“Always.”

“Good, me too.”

JJ rode one more wave, a wave so big that it wrapped around him like a cocoon and in the midst of the thunder and howls of John B in the distance, everything was quiet under its warm canopy. Until JJ closed his eyes to revel in the serenity and the wave wiped him out and dragged him under the surface of the ocean. JJ expected to rise through the water but suddenly something was tangled around his feet and his legs and it felt like a tornado or a snake. Reaching toward the board that was floating above the water once again, the ocean twirled and pulled at JJ until the air began to run dry and the panic settled in. 

A rip current. 

_Don’t fight it, don’t fight it_ , JJ silently chanted to himself but his instincts wanted to fight it and he kicked and scratched and spun until he felt dizzy and until the air bubbles stopped rising to the surface and his heart began to beat like the thunder in the distant sky. JJ knew he didn’t have much more oxygen in the tank and if his body wasn’t beginning to lose consciousness he would’ve let out a scream or begun to cry. _This can’t be it_.

In his nearly unconscious and finally relaxed state, JJ broke through the surface of the water and saw how far the current had carried him as John B ran along the edge of the shore calling out for him. 

“JJ! Swim diagonally! Swim that way,” John B screamed, flailing his entire body to the side so JJ might be able to see him. Finally able to take a breath, JJ stilled himself, began to tread, and then swam until he reached the shore and John B. 

All JJ could do was cough as John practically whimpered, “Oh, JJ. Oh, god, JJ.” 

John B was dragging him from underneath his arms so his feet dug tiny tracks in the sand as John B fell back and stuck JJ against his chest, clutching at him and pulling at his chest until JJ coughed up the last of the water. The salt in his mouth tasted like fish pee and JJ wondered just how much fish pee he had ingested in his entire life. 

“You’re okay, everything’s gonna be okay now, JJ,” John B was repeating to him, cradling his head from behind and steadying him. 

JJ wanted to say, _well, of course I am. I’m with you._ But that was stupid and his lungs hurt and his mouth still tasted like fish pee. 

So instead, JJ just set his hand atop of John B’s and let his best friend hold his hand while he caught his breath.

* * *

**four**

JJ never told anybody about the times his dad got a little too angry, a little too drunk, a little too distant. He had long sleeve shirts for the bruises on his arms and a wetsuit for the ones on his belly. He could always bite the inside of his cheek to sit up run when his legs felt like they were on fire and he could stay home ‘sick’ when there were hand prints on his neck. His dad sure as hell didn’t care if he showed up to school. And it was impossible to hurt your grades when you were already in the hole. 

JJ never told anybody but somehow he sometimes got the feeling that John B already knew. 

The summer before freshman year John B and JJ had worked for Mr. Heyward out catching fish alongside a dual, all-inclusive lawn service company they started and the boys had gotten pretty damn strong. Needless to say, JJ knew that sometimes John B tried to be extra gentle with JJ. 

At first it absolutely infuriated JJ. He would body slam into John B so he would fly off the dock and into the bay and he would pull John B into a headlock and hop on his back with such a force that it almost knocked John B onto his knees. And still John B’s fingers felt like feathers on his skin and when John B would throw an arm around him he always left room for JJ to flee, running soft circles into his skin and ruffling his hair like a child. He touched JJ even more gently than he touched girls and that’s when it really started to make JJ mad. 

They became friends with Pope that summer and John B would happily wrestle Pope off the docks or pull him into a headlock. It was just JJ who was treated like he was breakable. But JJ was a prideful guy, so he never said anything about it. 

JJ never said anything about anything, not really. Not the scary stuff anyway. 

Freshman year, a week or so after Thanksgiving, was the first time JJ had ever admitted to anyone in the world that sometimes his dad hurt him. And he told John B. 

Well, not so much told flat out, but showed up to the Chateau limping and crying. Big John would’ve answered the door but he was out on a fishing trip with a buddy. JJ knew this, and it was one of the only reasons why he had worked up the courage to show up at all. John B answered the door and JJ regretted coming immediately. 

JJ regretted coming because John B was watching him cry, staring at the bruises on his arms and his left eye and John B looked horrified and like he might start crying too. He was going to tell Big John and Big John would tell DCS and then JJ would get shipped off to the mainland and he would never see John B again or maybe his dad would actually kill him this time and—

And John B was pulling him into a hug and cradling his cheeks and wrapping his arms so securely around JJ it felt like an octopus and John B was warm, _so warm_ , and he smelled like the surf and canned soup and _home_. JJ cried so much he couldn’t see John B guiding them into the bathroom, sitting JJ down on the toilet seat and taking a first aid kit for the cut on JJ’s arm. John B didn’t know anything about first aid but he put a band aid on JJ’s arm as if it would fix everything and gave JJ a pair of sweatpants and a hoodie—which actually did fix a lot of things. 

As John B helped him take off his clothes and change into John B’s, JJ tried to subside his crying but it ended in hiccups and shaky breaths that sounded like a car muffler with sleep apnea. 

John B didn’t say anything the entire time. No _everything’s going to be okay_ or any shit like that which both of them knew wasn’t true. But John B tucked JJ into the bed—literally drew the covers around him and everything—and then slid right in beside him, wrapping his arms around protectively. Which of course was humiliating but JJ let himself lean into the touch, let himself cling to John B because he still couldn’t breath and he could still hear the clash off the bottle Luke had thrown at him. JJ wondered if many other fifteen-year-old guys held their friends this softly or if it was just John B. 

“I’ve got you,” John B whispered against JJ’s hair, the first words either had said all night. For once in his life, JJ really listened. “I’ve got you now.”

* * *

**five**

By sophomore year they’re not just John B and JJ anymore. Now they’re John B, JJ, Pope, and Kiara—they’re the Pogues. 

John B had started working at the Wreck and had met Kiara who instantly schooled him in a surf off and ever since had been a member of the Pogues. JJ never really understood why somebody like Kiara even bothered to spend time with himself and John B and even Pope—no matter how smart he was, he was still just as dumb as JJ and John B when it came to staying out of trouble. 

Regardless, they were a foursome now and most of the time that was great. John B had learned to drive Big John’s boat, JJ had more than learned how to talk to girls and where to buy weed, Pope had enough money saved to rent all the blockbuster movies as soon they came out, and Kiara was actually turning all three of them into somewhat better men and trying her hardest to teach Pope how to actually skateboard well. JJ was sure it was a lost cause. 

Usually they would bounce from spot to spot around the island, from the empty real estate Kook listings to the abandoned drive in movie theater on the Cut and back to the Wreck where Kie would magically convince her dad to grant them a free meal and then back to John B’s hippie van to watch the sunset. The weekends were always fun—after Kie and Pope had finished their school work and met up with JJ and John B. 

But while Kie and Pope were being boring a responsible, it was still just JJ and John B. Not that the two never did any school work or any chores, but mostly they sat around John B’s back porch under the fan and sprayed each other with a hose to beat the heat, or lounged on the pullout and the loveseat watching the Office reruns eating stale potato chips and dry cereal. Sometimes John B would try and cook something for them to eat—Big John took a lot of fishing trips, and was starting to leave more and more often on adventures around the island looking for the Royal Merchant; sometimes he was gone for a few days. They didn’t always know when he was coming home but more often than not it was the perfect time to down a six pack of PBRs and hit the cans with bb guns in the backyard. 

This particular Saturday morning, John B was feeling studious. 

“I can’t keep skimping on the homeworks man. Geometry is hard so I need to do well on these assignments so I don’t fail.”

“Everybody fails Geometry, bro. It’s like a rite of passage at Kildare.” 

“I’m serious, JJ. Come on, we can do it together so you can pass too.”

“Fine, but I’m making waffles after.”

“By all means!”

John B had decided they would split the ten questions so they each did five and then they would trade answers. Easy enough. After about thirty minutes, John B seemed to have finished and was looking over to JJ. 

“Ready?”

“Um…”

“That’s okay, how many did you get? We can do the rest together.” JJ flipped his pencil back and forth between his thumb and his middle finger, not wanting to meet John B’s eyes. 

“Did you even try to solve them?”

“Yes, I tried!”

“Well, what did you get?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean? If you didn’t even try just tell me. If you did them tell me what you got, JJ.”

“I don’t know, okay!”

“JJ?”

They were word problems and JJ really couldn’t be blamed for that. It wasn’t his fault that all the letters kept switching places and he couldn’t remember if it was 810 degrees or 180 degrees or 108 degrees in a triangle. 

“I just, I don’t know. Okay? This is really hard and I don’t think I’ll ever actually need to know how to find all the angles of a triangle anyway or figure out how long a hypotenuse is and so if I get them wrong it doesn’t even matter.”

“You’re probably right,” John B agreed, nodding but in the frustratingly gentle way that John B agreed with JJ when he was trying to talk him down from something. He got up from his chair and sat beside JJ so they were both on the same side of the table and examined JJ’s almost empty worksheet scattered in random numbers and jumbled letters. “But we need to pass this class so we can be juniors together next year. And who knows, maybe if my dad finds the gold I’ll buy a house in the shape of a triangle and I’ll need to measure the angles or some shit. Okay, number 5. One of the angles in a right triangle is known and we need to find the other two. So, there’s 180 degrees in every triangle and one angle is always 90 degrees, so we have one of them…”

JJ knew he should’ve watched what John B was scribbling down onto the paper, but instead all he could do was watched his curls bounce as he flicked his head back and forth trying to explain the stupid triangle problem to JJ—which turned out to not even be a real word problem but just the stupid instructions. He didn’t deserve John B, he really didn’t. And he sure as hell wouldn’t have made it this far without him.

* * *

**plus one**

Everything that followed the summer after sophomore year was a big, blobby, blur. JJ was living with the Heywards and Kie was in love with Pope—so much for no Pogue on Pogue macking—and John B was dead until he wasn’t and then suddenly the rug was pulled out from under them and John B was stumbling off the plane and into JJ’s arms. 

When John B called Pope had picked up the phone. _John B?_ And then JJ had ripped the phone out of his hands but Kie had decided it was only fair to put him on speaker. Embarrassingly—or maybe not, it was his best friend—JJ had cried through most of the conversation. But it wasn’t his fault; John B was _alive_ , okay? That was his person. But the gold was gone and Sarah’s dad was going to jail and apparently her brother was in trouble about something too but JJ didn’t really care because John B was going to be home in a week. 

The Pogues went straight to the Chateau when the call was over and started straightening up, cleaning up the broken glass and trash on the floors from when the men had ransacked it a few months back. JJ took it upon himself to clean out the rotting food from the fridge since Kie had already started cleaning the bathrooms and Pope was trying to reorganize Big John’s office. There was a foreclosure sign out front but JJ tore it from the ground and tossed it into the bay. Nobody was going to want to buy this place anyway, so JJ didn’t care that they were technically now trespassing on government property. This was John B’s house. 

Pope and Kie dragged JJ out around eleven. JJ wanted to keep cleaning but they reminded him that John B wouldn’t be home until the end of the week and he needed to sleep so he would be awake enough to actually greet John B when he got home. 

The entire week was misty in JJ’s memory because all he thought about all day was John B getting home. Sometimes he thought about how angry he was that John B didn’t tell them he was alive sooner, didn’t tell JJ that he was alive sooner. But JJ couldn’t even dwell on it long before he was overcome with excitement at the thought of John B actually living and breathing and coming _home_. 

By Saturday, JJ had decided he was going to let John B know he was mad. He was going to tear him a new one for letting JJ think he was dead for an entire month and he was going to let John B apologize. By Sunday, when John B was stumbling off the plane, JJ couldn’t even remember ever being mad. 

Sarah had been the first one off the plane, running to her mother who was in the little crowd of friends and family at the airport to greet them. Next came an officer that JJ didn’t recognize leading Ward and another leading Rafe—both in handcuffs—from the small plane. Finally, after what felt like ages, John B was tripping over his stupidly big feet with tears in his eyes grinning like a fool at JJ. 

And for the first time when John B hugged JJ he wasn’t gentle. His hug was firm and crushing and JJ lifted him off his feet until he realized how heavy John B was and set him back down before he fell over onto the concrete. When he tried to pull away to look at John B alive and up close, John B pulled him against his chest and then Pope and Kie leapt around them for a group hug. Suffocating slightly but never happier in his life, JJ latched onto John B until he couldn’t tell where he ended and John B began. 

Eventually they had pulled away and Pope had to hold onto JJ to keep him upright while John B said some goodbyes to Sarah—way too long if you asked JJ—and then the Pogues packed into the van and JJ slapped the keys into John B’s hand. 

“Take us home, brother.”

They all stayed at the Chateau that night, Kie and Pope on the pullout and JJ and John B on the mattress in John B’s room. Even though he was gone, nobody dared go in Big John’s bed. It got JJ thinking. 

“Any word about your dad?”

John B was halfway dressed when JJ asked and froze immediately at the question. For a moment JJ wondered if he should change the topic but then John B pulled his t shirt on and sat down at the foot of the bed. 

“Yeah, actually.”

“Not good news, I’m guessing?”

“He’s, uh. He’s dead, man.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.” 

JJ didn’t know what to do. If JJ’s dad had died maybe they’d be throwing a party of maybe he would let John B hold his hand and cuddle him until he fell asleep. But JJ didn’t know how to comfort John B. John B was never upset, when Big John left he cried some and when he had lady troubles he would mope around for a few days, but John B knew how to help himself and he always saw the bright side and believed it. JJ didn’t have a witty comment or a big wave that could fix this problem. Should he hug him? Should they sit there in silence?

“I mean,” John B began suddenly, voice low and tight, “all this time everybody kept telling me how sorry they were, and what a good guy he was. It’s like everybody knew something I didn’t. Maybe I was just a naïve kid to actually believe he was still alive. To believe we ever could’ve found the gold and actually gotten to keep it. What an idiot.”

JJ could head that John B had started to cry so he sat up and scooted closer to him so their thighs were side by side. It was the most comforting thing he could think to do. 

“I was so fucking stupid.” John B collapsed against JJ’s neck and suddenly he was sobbing but it was silent and collected as if his body and his brain were two separate entities. 

“You’re not stupid, John B. Not even a little bit.” John B lifted his head at that comment and shook it, kicking his feet against the bed frame and raking a hand through his curls. 

“I almost killed Sarah in that storm. I could’ve told her to stay because I knew, man, I knew I could get myself killed in that storm. But I let her get on the boat.”

“That’s a little stupid but that doesn’t count anyway because you’re in love and everyone gets to do stupid stuff when they’re in love,” JJ tried to reassure him but John B simply shook his head again. 

“And you, JJ. I didn’t even know your fucking phone number because I just click on your contact every time and so when we got to a phone I couldn’t even call you and I let you think I was dead even though I knew you needed me and it was so stupid.” His head dropped back on JJ’s neck but this time JJ slung an arm around his shoulder. 

“It’s not on you to take care of me, John B. I’m a big boy.”

John B pressed a kissed to JJ’s cheek and he would slap him for that if he wasn’t crying right now. 

“Of course it is, man. You’re my brother. I gotta look out for you and you thought I was dead. Where have you been staying? Promise me you haven’t been with Luke all this time?”

“Even now, John B. Stop, okay? I’ve been staying with the Heywards, but that’s beside the point. Just stop worrying about me and let me take care of you for once. Your dad’s dead, John B.”

“He’s been dead for months,” John B whimpered as a sob wracked through his body. “All this time.” JJ brought his other arm around John B so they were in a proper hug, like the ones John B would pull him into after a bad fight with Luke. “I miss him so much.”

“I know.”

“I don’t know what’s gonna happen now. If DCS is gonna take me away or send me to the mainland.”

“Don’t think about that right now, John B. I’ve wasted enough time thinking about that and it’s never helped me much of anything. But do you know what has?”

“What?” sniffled John B. 

“This. You and me. Right now let’s just sit here together and tomorrow we’ll just get up and face the day like it’s any other day. John B and JJ.”

“John B and JJ.”


End file.
